2010-2019

Etta Whitner Patterson

Etta Whitner Patterson was born and raised in Asheville’s historic “East End” neighborhood. A student at the segregated Stephens-Lee High School in the late 1950s and early 1960s, Patterson became one of the leaders of ASCORE, the Asheville Student Committee on Racial Equality, and served as the group’s second president. Inspired by the message of nonviolence and love of Martin Luther King Jr., the students of ASCORE worked to dismantle segregation in Asheville’s public institutions through peaceful protest. In the fall of 1961, Patterson became the first black student admitted to Asheville-Biltmore College, UNC Asheville’s predecessor institution. Patterson’s career has included serving as director for the Greenville Urban League, a historic civil rights organization dedicated to economic empowerment; program coordinator for the Greenville County Special Needs and Disability Services Board; an outreach worker with a community action organization; secretary for the Green Avenue Area Civic Association to address drug crime; and as a substitute teacher.

S. Tucker Cooke

S. Tucker Cooke joined the art faculty of Asheville-Biltmore College in 1966. During his four decades at the university—including more than 30 years as department chair—he was instrumental in expanding the art department in both size and reputation. In 1995, he received a distinguished teaching award from the university. In 2000, Cooke was awarded the North Carolina Award in Fine Arts, the highest award a civilian can receive from the Governor of North Carolina. UNC Asheville’s art gallery in Owen Hall is named in Cooke’s honor. In 2007, Cooke directed the creation of UNC Asheville’s School of Athens mural the hangs in Highsmith Student Union, a full-scale reproduction of the 16th century Vatican fresco by Raphael, with special details added, such as the two bulldogs for UNC Asheville’s mascot. Cooke, who works primarily in paint and mixed media, has participated in numerous solo exhibitions and has had his work accepted in many competitive group exhibitions. His work is on display in The Asheville Art Museum, the Hunter Museum of American Art in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and the Mint Museum in Charlotte, North Carolina. In 2017, Cooke was presented with “The Inaugural Founder’s Award” by UNC Asheville students and faculty.

Ko Barrett

Ko Barrett, a graduate of UNC Asheville, returned in 2017 as the commencement speaker. Barrett currently serves as the deputy assistant administrator for research at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), supervising the daily operations and administration of NOAA’s research enterprise, and the execution of NOAA programs including the Climate Program Office, Ocean Acidification Program, the National Sea Grant College Program, Ocean Exploration and Research, and the Office of Weather and Air Quality research. Barrett earned a Bachelor of Science in environmental studies from UNC Asheville in 1994, where she was named a University Scholar as well as a Distinguished Research Scholar, and was elected a member of Sigma Xi, the Scientific Research Society. Her daughter, Elizabeth (Ellie) Hoover, graduated from UNC Asheville in 2014, with a degree in psychology.

Olson Huff, M.D.

Dr. Olson Huff, a Kentucky native, has practiced pediatrics in North Carolina all of his professional career, first in Charlotte, and since 1982, in Asheville, where in 1987 he established the child development program, subsequently named in his honor, at Thoms Hospital. In 1994, he became the founding Medical Director of the Ruth and Billy Graham Children’s Health Center at Mission Hospital and under his leadership, Mission Children’s Hospital, the only children’s hospital in Western North Carolina, was formed. The Olson Huff Center for Child Development became a part of the Children’s Hospital in 1996. He was also instrumental in the development of health care resources for underserved children in rural Western North Carolina. Dr. Huff serves on a number of boards and was recently appointed by the Governor of North Carolina to the N.C. Early Childhood Advisory Council. He holds an undergraduate degree from the University of Kentucky and a medical degree from the University of Louisville, and is a veteran of the United States Air Force.

Stoney Lamar

Stoney Lamar is a prolific woodturner who produces his work in Saluda, North Carolina, and has contributed exceptional skill and vision to the world of woodturning for more than 25 years. He has been creating, selling and exhibiting work constantly since the mid-80s, including public collections in the American Craft Museum, the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, England, and the Renwick Gallery of the Museum of American Art at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C. Lamar has been a board member of the American Craft Council, president and board member of the Southern Highlands Handicraft Guild, a founding member of the American Association of Woodturners, and board president of the Center for Craft, Creativity & Design. He spent time at both UNC-Chapel Hill and UNC Asheville before receiving his degree in industrial arts from Appalachian State University.

Ellen Bird

Ellen Wachacha Bird is an elder of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians and was recently given the title of Beloved Woman, a designation bestowed upon Cherokee women who are highly respected for their service to the community, their integrity and their good character. A fluent Cherokee speaker, she has shared her knowledge of Cherokee traditions, including medicines, quilting and food, not only with her 10 children, but also with the community. As a Beloved Woman, she is recognized as someone the community can call a sister, a mom or a grandmother, and she is well-known among children for teaching a quilting class in the Summer Arts Camp as part of the Graham County Indian Education Program. Bird was honored as a matriarch at the 100th anniversary of the Cherokee Indian Fair. She was also recognized as a Distinguished Citizen on Ned Long Day in November 2006.

Virgil Smith

Virgil Smith, the 2016 commencement speaker, is a talented publisher and manager with 24 years at The Gannett Company, serving as vice president of talent management, vice president for talent acquisition and vice president for diversity. He was promoted to those posts after a decade as president and publisher of the Asheville Citizen-Times and was the first African-American publisher of a mainstream newspaper in the state of North Carolina. Smith has won awards for distinguished leadership in increasing access and opportunities to people of color in journalism, and improving the coverage of communities of color in American media. His numerous local awards include the Asheville Area Chamber of Commerce Partners in Education Volunteer of the Year Award; the 18th Annual Dr. King’s Legacy of Peace, Justice and Community Award; a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Asheville-Buncombe Community Relations Council; and many others. Smith earned his Bachelor of Science Degree and Master of Science Degree in Human Resources and Organization Development from the University of San Francisco. He also is the parent of a UNC Asheville alum.

John Cram

Creative entrepreneur John Cram has been called an influential figure in political and conservation arenas and a leader in the renaissance of the Asheville community. Cram moved to Asheville in the early 1970s, and over the course of two decades he started two galleries, two clothing stores, and revitalized Asheville’s Fine Arts Theatre. First he founded New Morning Gallery in Biltmore Village and started the Village Art and Craft Fair in the same year. That fair now brings more than 120 artists to Biltmore Village each August. He also opened the Blue Spiral 1 fine art gallery in downtown Asheville, and followed that by opening the Fine Arts Theatre next door. He later added a second clothing store downtown, Bellagio Everyday. In 2013, he received the state’s highest civilian honor, the North Carolina Award for fine arts. Most recently, he was designated a “Downtown Hero” by the Asheville Downtown Association.

Julia Ray

Centenarian Julia Ray has more than half a century of local business ownership and acumen to her name. She founded the Jesse Ray Funeral Home with her husband in 1938, and the 101-year-old maintains her license as a funeral director, though her son now operates the family business. She is also well-known on UNC Asheville’s campus, having established The Julia G. Ray Endowed Scholarship to support one student each year. Ray was the first African-American on the Board of Trustees of Mission Hospital, and she served as trustee for both UNC Asheville and the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at UNC Asheville (then called the NC Center for Creative Retirement). She also served on the Friends of the YMI and helped to establish the Goombay Festival. Among other honors, Ray is the recipient of the Mission/MAHEC Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Lifetime Achievement Award for her pioneering service to the Asheville medical community. She was named a “Living Treasure” by Asheville’s Living Treasure Committee in 2013.

Wiley Cash

Wiley Cash, the 2015 commencement speaker, is the author of two award-winning and best-selling novels, “A Land More Kind than Home” and “This Dark Road to Mercy.” After growing up in Gastonia, Cash came to UNC Asheville where he became student body president, studied Appalachian history as well as literature, and fell in love with the rural mountain areas surrounding Asheville. He went on to earn a master’s degree at The University of North Carolina at Greensboro and a Ph.D. at the University of Louisiana-Lafayette, but carried with him reflections and images of Western North Carolina that pour forth in his writing. Cash now lives in Wilmington and teaches writing at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and in the Low-Residency MFA Program in Fiction and Nonfiction Writing at Southern New Hampshire University.

Principal Chief Michell Hicks

Principal Chief Michell Hicks, a native of the Qualla Boundary, has been a leading public servant of the 15,000-member Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians for two decades. He was first elected principal chief in 2003 and has continued to serve in that capacity, having been reelected in 2007 and 2011. During his tenure as principal chief, the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians has used expanded revenues from its gaming resort to improve the quality of life for the Cherokee, including the opening of a new Cherokee language-based school, the New Kituwah Academy. A certified public accountant with a background in finance, Hicks also served the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians as executive director of budget and finance for approximately seven years before being elected principal chief. He also offers his leadership and expertise as board member on many important Native American institutions and organizations, including the Museum of the Cherokee Indian, the Cherokee Preservation Foundation, the National Congress of the American Indian, and the National Indian Gaming Association. Hicks was named 2015 Tribal Leader of the Year by the Native American Financial Officers Association.

Arthur Levine

The 2014 commencement speaker, Arthur Levine, is one of America’s leading experts on higher education and the way the beliefs and needs of college students have changed over generations. The author of many books, including his most recent, Generation on a Tightrope: A Portrait of Today’s College Student, Levine also has written numerous commentaries for The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, Education Week and The Chronicle of Higher Education. Levine currently serves as president of the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation. Levine also has held leadership positions in some of the nation’s most prestigious institutions of higher learning, including Columbia University, where he was president and professor of education at Teachers College. At Harvard University, he served as chair of the higher education program, chair of the Institute for Educational Management and senior lecturer at the Graduate School of Education.

Eli Evans

Historian Eli Evans, a native of Durham, has chronicled the Jewish experience in towns throughout the American South, and in so doing, has shed new light on the Southern experience. Evans’ classic, “The Provincials: A Personal History of Jews in the South,” has been continuously in print since its publication in 1973, with updates in 1997 and a second edition in 2005 by University of North Carolina Press. Among Evans’ other works are “Judah P. Benjamin: The Jewish Confederate,” a biography of the Confederacy’s Secretary of State; and “The Lonely Days Were Sundays: Reflections of a Jewish Southerner,” a collection of essays. Evans is a graduate of Yale Law School, a U.S. Navy veteran, and once served as a speechwriter for President Lyndon Johnson. Evans is president emeritus of the Charles H. Revson Foundation, which operates grant programs in urban affairs, Jewish life and education.

Franklin McCain

Franklin McCain (1941-2014) was honored posthumously with an honorary degree at the 2014 commencement. While just a freshman at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, McCain became a civil rights pioneer as one of the “Greensboro Four.” With three fellow freshmen, he began a sit-in at the then-segregated Woolworth’s lunch counter in Greensboro. This protest and the resulting publicity contributed to an intensification of the sit-in movement that helped desegregate public facilities across the South. McCain went on to become a chemist, a member of the Board of Trustees of his alma mater, a trustee for North Carolina Central University, and as a member of the UNC Board of Governors, was liaison to UNC Asheville. Members of McCain’s family – Franklin McCain Jr., Vicki McCain, Taylor McCain, and Franklin McCain III – along with Janice Allen, widow of another of the Greensboro Four, attended commencement to receive the honorary degree.

Nikki Giovanni

Nikki Giovanni, the 2013 commencement speaker, is a world-renowned poet, writer, commentator, activist and educator. A native of Knoxville, Tenn., who grew up in Cincinnati, Giovanni graduated with honors from Fisk University and later studied at the University of Pennsylvania and Columbia University. Giovanni is a University Distinguished Professor at Virginia Tech and author of some 30 books for both adults and children. Known for her outspoken advocacy for civil rights, Giovanni is also one of the most widely-read American poets; she has been awarded the Langston Hughes Medal for poetry. Her children’s picture book “Rosa,” about the civil rights legend Rosa Parks, reached number three on the New York Times Bestseller list and became a Caldecott Honors Book. Her autobiography, “Gemini,” was a finalist for the National Book Award. Giovanni was named Woman of the Year by Mademoiselle, Ladies’ Home Journal and Ebony magazines and was the first recipient of the Rosa L. Parks Woman of Courage Award.

Warren Haynes

One of Asheville’s favorite native sons, Warren Haynes is known for expanding his musical and philanthropic contributions to his hometown while achieving national and international stature that continues to grow in the world of rock music. Haynes first gained fame for his singing, guitar work and songwriting as a member of the Allman Brothers Band, and he has developed a long-term musical relationship with Phil Lesh and Friends and also performed with The Dead (led by former members of the Grateful Dead). Haynes also is a founding member of Gov’t Mule, which continues to thrive after almost two decades and 16 albums. In Asheville, Haynes is thought of most fondly at holiday time, thanks to his annual Warren Haynes Presents Christmas Jam, which draws top talent from across the country and has become one of the city’s largest charity fundraising events. Haynes has used the Jam to raise more than $1 million for Asheville Area Habitat for Humanity. Haynes has won several Grammy awards and ranks at number 23 on Rolling Stone’s list of “The 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time.”

Erskine B. Bowles

Erskine Bowles served as president of the multi-campus University of North Carolina from 2006 to 2011. Born and raised in Greensboro, N.C., he is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (1967) and Columbia University’s Graduate School of Business. After beginning his career at Morgan Stanley & Co., he later returned home to North Carolina, and during his life founded multiple financial companies. In 1993, Bowles was appointed by President Bill Clinton to serve as director of the Small Business Administration. He later was tapped to serve as Clinton’s deputy White House chief of staff (1994–95) and White House chief of staff (1996–98). As chief of staff, he helped negotiate the first balanced budget in a generation. After he left the White House, Bowles returned to the finance and investment industries while continuing his lifelong commitment to public service.

Alfred J. Whitesides Jr.

Al Whitesides is best known throughout the Asheville community as a successful businessman, a community leader and a living touchstone to the city’s struggle to eliminate segregation. While attending the segregated African-American Stephens-Lee High School in the early 1960s, he and his classmates joined ASCORE (Asheville Student Committee on Racial Equality). The group organized and participated in nonviolent demonstrations to desegregate local businesses. Whitesides remained active in the Civil Rights movement while attending college, often bringing his textbooks to lunch-counter sit-ins. After working for 34 years with First Union National Bank, and later Wachovia, Whitesides joined with Mountain 1st Bank and Trust, where he served as vice president until retirement. Today, he is president of the UNC Asheville Bulldog Athletic Association and was chairman of the University’s Board of Trustees. He also has served the Asheville City Schools Board of Education, YMI Cultural Center and Mission Healthcare Foundation Board.

Thomas W. Ross

Thomas W. Ross became the fifth president of the 17-campus University of North Carolina system in January 2011. A native of Greensboro, N.C., he holds a bachelor’s degree in political science from Davidson College (1972) and graduated with honors from the UNC-Chapel Hill School of Law (1975). At age 33, Ross was appointed to the North Carolina Superior Court—a position he held for 17 years. During that time, he led the development of innovative sentencing policies for violent criminals and repeat offenders. The new system was adopted by the N.C. General Assembly and became a model for similar programs nationwide. In 2007, Ross was named president of Davidson College. Under his leadership, the college implemented the Davidson Trust, which provides grants that allow students to graduate debt-free.

Clemmie Dixon “Dick” Spangler

Dick Spangler is an accomplished North Carolina businessman and education leader. The first in his family to go to college, Spangler graduated from UNC-Chapel Hill and earned a master’s degree from Harvard University Business School. Spangler paired his business achievements with a dedication to public service. In 1972, he was elected to the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education. There he championed the integration of North Carolina public schools and the establishment of public kindergarten for all five-year-olds. In 1986, Spangler was named the second president of the University of North Carolina system. Though he held the office for 11 years, Spangler never accepted a paycheck, choosing instead to donate his salary back to the university system. As president, Spangler fought hard to keep tuition “as low as practicable,” and he selected the university system’s first two women chancellors.

Bernice Johnson Reagon

Renowned singer, speaker, and civil rights worker, Bernice Johnson Reagon was an original member of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee Freedom Singers, a founding member of the Harambee Singers and she formed the internationally renowned African American women’s a capella ensemble, Sweet Honey In The Rock. She led the group until retirement in early 2004 and has been featured on numerous solo and group recordings. She has also acted as music consultant, composer and performer for several film and video projects, including the award-winning “Eyes on the Prize,” the Emmy-winning “We Shall Overcome” and the feature film “Beloved.” She wrote a seminal text on the subject of African American sacred music. Professor emeritus of history at American University, Reagon also served as curator at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History and as the 2002-04 Cosby Chair of Fine Arts at Spelman College. Currently, she is a popular speaker at venues across the nation, performing in her unique song-talk style.

Dean Smith

Dean Smith, a basketball legend, coached the North Carolina Tar Heels from 1961 until his retirement in 1997, winning two national championships. Under Smith, the UNC-Chapel Hill men’s basketball program had one of the nation’s highest winning percentages and one of the nation’s highest graduation rates, with 96.6% of its players earning their degrees. While at North Carolina, Smith also helped promote desegregation by recruiting the university’s first African American scholarship basketball player, Charlie Scott, and working for equal treatment for African Americans by local businesses. Dean Smith was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1983, two years after his induction into the North Carolina Hall of Fame. The basketball arena at UNC-Chapel Hill, the Dean Smith Center, also known as the “Dean Dome,” is named for Smith.

Roy Williams

Asheville native Roy Williams, coach of the North Carolina Tar Heels, is among the most successful college basketball coaches in history. His teams have a combined 611–154 record, the highest winning percentage of any coach in men’s basketball with ten years experience. Williams coached the University of Kansas men’s basketball team for 15 years, reaching the NCAA Tournament Final Four four times. Then in 2003, he took over as head coach of UNC-Chapel Hill where his teams have won two national championships. He has also won the Associated Press Coach of the Year award twice. A graduate of UNC-Chapel Hill, Williams began his coaching career at Owen High School in Swannanoa. He was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2007.